NASA High-Altitude Balloon Completes Record-Length Test Flight

On May 16, almost two months ago, NASA launched a balloon high into the atmosphere. On Saturday, it finally came down. The balloon, a NASA Super Pressure Balloon, was designed to float about 100,000 feet above sea level for months, carrying scientific equipment for a variety of experiments. It flew for 46 days, 20 hours, and 19 minutes, the longest ever mid-latitude flight of a heavy lift scientific research balloon.

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NASA initially planned for the SPB to stay in the air for a full 100 days, but ended the mission early due to some variations in the balloon's altitude. The SPB was designed to stay at an altitude of about 110,000 feet, but started dropping to 70,000 or 80,000 feet at night over the last few weeks. The team suspected that the balloon lost some helium while passing through an early cold storm. NASA safely terminated the balloon flight over Peru, where it landed in the mountainous region north of Camana. Recovery of the balloon and the payload is in progress.

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This was the second test flight of the SPB, and the first carrying a payload. The balloon brought the Compton Spectrometer and Imager into the upper atmosphere, where it actually managed to record its first ever gamma ray burst on May 30. Gamma ray bursts are from high-energy astronomical events, such as black hole mergers and supernovae.

NASA hopes that future long-duration SPB flights will provide a low-cost alternative to launching satellites for astronomy and atmospheric science.